I was back in my body, back with the pain, in desperate need of air. And so very, very tired. It was tough even to keep my eyes open. I wanted to slip away…I managed—just—to wrench the sword point from my cabochon. The gem closed up behind the blade, leaving the surface unblemished.
Temellin stood rigid and taut a few paces away. His cabochon glowed gold, casting an eerie light on his sweat-glazed skin and the knotted muscles of his body. The fluid ooze of the Ravage did not seem to touch him; he had enclosed himself within a warded space, perhaps more out of distaste for his surroundings than any real need. The corruption of the Ravage could not hurt an essensa. Nor could its creatures; they swam in frustrated circles, tails flicking angrily, spines and claws and talons extended.
Temellin gave them a cursory glance as though he were dismissing them from his calculations. I knew better; he paid them no attention because he didn’t need to just then—but he knew exactly how dangerous they would be to me the moment I left the cocoon of safety the Mirage Makers had built for me.
He looked up at Brand and made a throwing gesture with his hand, following it with a mime of rope pulling. Seconds later, a length of rope curled out over the Ravage, rested for a moment on the surface scum, then began to sink, slowly, through the muck. Ignored by the swimming beasts, it finally landed several paces from where I lay.
I didn’t know what good it would do. I was too weak to move, too close to suffocation to do more than lie as still as possible. And Temellin couldn’t touch or hold anything.
I underestimated him. He may not have been able to pick up the rope, but with his cabochon powers he could call up a wind, and he could penetrate the ward the Mirage Makers had placed around me. It was hardly a gale he created, but it was sufficient to stir the viscidity of the Ravage, to create a flow. The Ravage resisted, but it was Temellin who prevailed. The rope wavered forward on the flux, inched into my cocoon of protection and then under the curve of my ankle. It took longer to coax the flow upwards so the rope snaked around my foot, then over itself to make a knot.
Finally it was done.
Temellin looked at me in compassion, then nodded to Brand.
And I was back in the Ravage, back in the agony, back in the midst of the beasts. A battle boiled around me, with Temellin at the centre of it. Gold fire sizzled in rotting flesh, globules of molten fire spattered and burned. A worm-shaped creature disintegrated in a gush of pus; another melted. Something tangled momentarily in my hair before a beam of light seared a hole through its body and, threshing in pain, it dropped away into the depths. I was drenched with the decay of evil. I swam in bloodied slime and green rot…
Then I was free, cradled in Brand’s arms. I let go and faded into the nothingness beyond me.
When I woke, I didn’t open my eyes. I wanted to test the world little by little, one sense at a time, in case it was better not to wake at all.
Touch first. I was warm. I was wrapped up in something that prickled roughly, and the heat from a fire warmed one side of my body. More intimately, joints and muscles protested; my skin felt raw enough to have been exposed to the Shiver Barrens for a day or two; my cheek ached. A tentative fingering of my face told me I had an indentation there that would be permanent. I’d been scarred.
Next, hearing. The crackle of the fire, the far-off sound of river water over stones, and the nearby rustle of someone moving quietly. I had the idea it had been a voice that had awoken me. They were all pleasant sounds.
And pleasant smells too: the sweet scent of cooking remba rhizomes mixed with barbecued meat. Brand had been hunting again. There was also a whiff of shleth, a little too strong an aroma for my taste, as though I’d been snuggled up to one in my sleep.
Next, I tried my cabochon sensing powers—nothing. They were far too weak.
I opened my eyes.
Temellin’s essensa hovered at my side; Brand was by the fire. Neither of them was looking at me. Brand was gazing at Temellin belligerently, which seemed odd, considering the essensa was now much more ethereal than it had been. In such a form, the Mirager was hardly somebody to raise Brand’s ire. But irate he was. He said, ‘Do you know what hell she went through thinking she would be the one to supply the Mirage with what it needed? She thought she was the one who was going to die, Temellin—all those weeks of imprisonment she thought she was doomed—and all you could do was turn your back. Ocrastes damn you, was it her fault she was taken by Tyrans as a child?’
I had evidently woken in the middle of what must surely have been a one-sided argument. I moved restlessly, and they both swung towards me. ‘He knows it, Brand,’ I said. ‘Leave it be, eh?’
He stared at me, expressionless, then shrugged and turned away.
I looked back at Temellin. ‘You are weakening. You must go back. Now.’ I hesitated, not wanting to say goodbye, because any farewell would seem too final. In the end, I settled for: ‘I’ll miss you.’ It sounded banal and quite inadequate.
He nodded, but made no move to go.
‘Tem—I’m fine. You’ve healed the worst—the rest will improve with time. And the baby is fine too.’ He still didn’t move. What was it Brand had said? He’s not that sort of man—
He was blackmailing me. And I wasn’t foolish enough to call his bluff. I capitulated, as he guessed I would, and threw up my hands. ‘All right, all right! We intend to ride south, to Ordensa, to arrange a passage for Tyr. But I’ll wait for you there first. It’s a small place, isn’t it? You’ll find me. I’ll wait two weeks; no longer. But, Tem, it will just be to say goodbye. We have to be in Tyr ahead of Favonius and the Stalwarts, because I need time to settle my affairs before Rathrox moves in and seizes my property.’
He smiled, a smile of angry triumph, and then he was gone, fading out within a second.
Brand sighed. ‘One day you’ll have to tell me about the Magor and shades. But not now. I feel as if I’ve had enough unpleasant surprises to last several lifetimes. Are you hungry?’
‘Ravenous.’ I tried to struggle up, but pain in my chest made me wince. ‘By all that’s holy, how did I manage to crack a rib?’
Brand looked guilty. ‘Er, well that was me, actually. You didn’t seem to be breathing when we got you out, and I couldn’t feel your heart, so I sort of, um, thumped you to get things started again, while Temellin did whatever it is you people do with that cabochon thing.’
I groaned and bit off the ungracious complaint I was tempted to utter; instead, I managed to sound grateful as I thanked him. He helped me to sit up and I looked around.
We had left the Mirage. We were in the foothills somewhere, near a stream, and I was safe from the Ravage. Our shleths were grazing nearby; those scarifying peaks of the Alps towered beyond. It all looked peaceful. And normal.
I glanced down at the blanket covering me and identified the source of the strong smell of shleth. ‘Saddlecloths?’
He gave a dismissive wave of the hand. ‘Our cloaks went down with the building. Fortunately there were a few odds and ends still in the saddlebags, including your purse and a change of clothing. ’Fraid that’s all we’ve got.’
‘My sword. What happened to my sword?’
‘It’s safe. You held on to it. You dropped the rope—but not your sword.’ He snorted. ‘Typical bloody-mindedness.’
I managed a smile, as he had hoped I would. ‘Watch who you insult, you Altani barbarian. And tell me what happened.’
‘You’ve been out for a full day. Temellin healed you. Mostly, anyhow. I guess a broken rib takes time to grow back properly.’
I looked at my cabochon. The gem really was whole again, without any sign of a crack or cut, although it was colourless. My hand touched my cheek, not wanting to remember.
He cleared his throat. He could have offered all kinds of platitudes to console. Instead, he said, ‘It’s noticeable. And not pretty. It’s red and puckered. The colour will fade with time. It won’t matter to him any more than it matters to me. Don’t worry about it.’
‘I don’t.’
He heard the catch in my voice. ‘What is it? The baby?’
‘He’s fine. It wasn’t the baby I was thinking of—it was you.’
‘What about me?’
‘I’m not blind, Brand. What’s wrong with your arm?’
‘I had to haul you out somehow.’ He swallowed. ‘It’s not so very terrible.’
I reached up to run my fingers down his left arm from shoulder to wrist. The arm was withered, without muscle or strength, a pitiful parody of what it had been.
I asked, ‘Why didn’t he heal you too?’
‘All his efforts had to go to you. You were so close to death. And it took all the strength he had. I don’t begrudge the way he used his power, Ligea, and neither should you.’
I said sadly, ‘I can’t heal it now, Brand. It is too late. And I’m too weak anyway.’
He gave another shrug. ‘I guessed as much. It doesn’t matter. It gives me no pain, and I still have some use of my fingers. It’s just there’s not much strength there any more. Neither of us has come through this unscathed—but we are still here.’
I took his hand in mine. ‘Dear friend. How much I owe you.’
He gave a smile. ‘Maybe I’ll claim the debt one day—from the next Exaltarch of Tyrans.’
He would, too, the Altani bastard. I grinned at him.